


Midsummer Moon

by Metallic_Sweet



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: (who do you come home to when the war is over?), Birds, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Declarations Of Love, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Black Eagles Route, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Not Exactly Dinner Parties From Hell, Self-Denial, Self-Discovery, Winemaking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:20:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22035469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Metallic_Sweet/pseuds/Metallic_Sweet
Summary: The war is over. Those Who Slither in the Dark are no more.Hubert begins to pick up the pieces.
Relationships: Ferdinand von Aegir/Hubert von Vestra
Comments: 36
Kudos: 393





	Midsummer Moon

**0.**

“One day,” Ferdinand says, “this will all be over.” 

He says these words through closed teeth and slightly parted lips. A bright healer’s lamp is mounted over them both. Hubert does not respond immediately. He has to concentrate on picking tiny glass shards out of Ferdinand’s left cheek and side of his nose, 

“Yes,” Hubert says, and he drops a shard onto the tray and douses the tweezers in alcohol. “We are not going to fail.” 

“I do not doubt our success,” Ferdinand says.

Hubert lifts his head. He watches the tiny trickles of blood from the open wounds. The orange colour of Ferdinand’s eyes. 

“But when this is over,” he says as Hubert reaches out to get another shard from his face, “how will we know?” 

**i.**

There is a dove nesting above the castle gate. She built her nest atop jutting that once mounted the stone crest of House Hresvelg. It looks like it is made of hay from the stables and twigs from the gardens. 

Hubert noticed the brown body proudly plopped there a couple weeks before, when the sun was bright in the late spring. The young made soft peeps, likely freshly hatched. Hubert stood for a long moment, looking up as the dove looked down at him with one, unwavering red eye. 

_Fight me,_ she seemed to be saying. 

The thought made Hubert smile. 

He turned his gaze back into the castle and walked away. 

**ii.**

Since the true end of the war, Hubert’s morning routine is predictable. 

He wakes usually past breakfast but before morning audiences. He drinks a cup of water, shaves, and dresses. He goes for a walk around the castle grounds because Manuela instructed him to prevent progression of the bone stiffness in his right ankle and knee. He stops to pick up reports from the gates, and then returns by the main gate to assist Edelgard with the morning audiences. 

Since he noticed the dove and her brood, Hubert has made a habit of stopping to look each morning. Edelgard is also aware of his new habit, and the morning main gatekeepers have begun to take special interest in the fledglings. 

“Doves nest in the same place every year,” one of the gatekeepers says as the fledglings begin to make short adventures to the edge of the nest in their haphazard, fluffy plumage. “If we don’t move them, they’ll all start coming back.”

Hubert finds himself checking the doves in the afternoon just before a meeting with the Blacksmith Guild after that comment. The afternoon gatekeepers are surprised by his sudden and unusual appearance. They barely manage to greet him before his check that the doves are still there is done and he rushes back inside. 

That moment of weakness is enough. Word gets around by the next morning that the Minister of the Imperial Household is fond of the doves nesting on the castle gate. Hubert is, despite himself, somewhat embarrassed, especially when the morning gatekeepers attempt to apologise to him and Edelgard graces him with one of her rare amused smiles. 

“I didn’t know you like doves,” she says as he helps her adjust her skirts over the small footstool for comfort sitting on the throne. 

“I have little opinion regarding them,” Hubert says, attempting to sound less ridiculous than he feels. 

“It pleases me that you have taken an interest in the doves,” Edelgard tells him later over lunch, which is a rare event as it is just the two of them. 

Hubert swallows a piece of cabbage that he nearly choked on. “It does?” he asks, unable to hide his incredulousness. 

“I think they’re sweet,” she says, smiling as she raises a spoonful of peach sorbet to her mouth. 

Hubert, his chest tight, tries his best to smile back. 

**iii.**

The fledglings leave the nest just before midsummer. 

Hubert gets to watch the second fledgling make its successful leap into its first flight because the afternoon gatekeepers sent a messenger down to his labs. The next morning, the mother has abandoned the nest. Hubert looks up at the empty jut of stone with the empty nest and has to use all of his will to keep his impassive expression in place. 

“I’m sure she’ll be back next year,” the morning gatekeeper not responsible for the earlier hubbub says. 

Hubert inclines his head. He doesn’t say anything and heads into the castle. 

**iv.**

Ferdinand returns to Enbarr from overseeing the annual Aegir plantings on the eve of midsummer. He comes with three carts of wine barrels, the second vintage made from Aegir’s revitalised winemaking. Last year’s had tasted young, aged only a couple of years, but they had sold well, especially since wine had become scarcer and scarcer since the war and end of the Church. 

“Edelgard, Hubert!” Ferdinand booms as he crashes an exceptionally boring morning audience about bookselling rights. “I’ve brought you the first taste of summer!”

“Ferdinand,” Edelgard says, as the three petitioners from the Stationers Guild recover from their shock. “Thank you. It is good to have you back.”

“Of course it is,” Ferdinand chirps as he breezes over and picks part of the file of unauthorised book reproductions spread on the table. “Oh, I am glad we are discussing this! I have been concerned with some of the odd Church teaching texts that seem to be showing up at market.”

The petitioners immediately brighten to be faced with someone with at least a little knowledge of their issues. The rest of the audience goes smoothly, Ferdinand breezing through assuaging their concerns with points of easy action. It helps, Hubert thinks, that Ferdinand smells of fresh air and late hyacinths. The latter fragrance more apparent when, in response to a small joke from one of the guild members, Ferdinand laughs and tosses his hair. 

“Of course this will be dealt with in a timely manner, but not until after the Midsummer Festival!” he enthuses, which draws smiling nods from the petitioners who had been quite glum until his arrival. “I hope you all have plans to attend!” 

He’s taken on a light tan and a dense flush of freckles, Hubert notes as they adjourn to change before lunch. His hair is longer and wilder than it is when he left Enbarr in the early spring, the colour more intense for the sun exposure. Aside from the smell of hyacinths, Ferdinand seems to do the bare minimum to keep it clean and even that as an afterthought. 

“Would you join us for lunch,” Edelgard is asking Ferdinand as he, she, and Hubert exit by the side door towards their living quarters, “or do you need to oversee the wine delivery?” 

“I do need to see to the wine delivery,” Ferdinand says, and his smile is wide and enthusiastic he waves them on. “I will join you to debrief after afternoon audiences!”

“For dinner then,” Edelgard says, mild and amused. 

“For dinner!” Ferdinand booms before snapping his fingers as an idea lights his eyes. “We will try the wine!” 

“That would be amiable,” Edelgard says with a small smile spreading her lips as she lifts her hands to flick her fingers at Ferdinand. “Now, shoo.” 

Ferdinand snorts but turns and hurries back towards the courtyard. Hubert watches the quick, even pace of his feet. His boots could use a shine, reflecting he likely rode out before morning light. Hubert feels –

He turns, falls into step with Edelgard, and does not finish that thought. 

**0.**

Ferdinand’s hands are warm. Extraordinarily strong with calluses from all manner of weapon on his palms and fingers. There are tiny scars, young and old, over his hands, wrists, up his arms and at his shoulders. There are less scars on his chest and back, but these are of worse wounds. Arrows that pierced through armour and nicked into belly and chest. One particularly bad shot that went between ribs and barely missed his right lung. A deep slash that cut through armour, mail, and tunic to his back, opening flesh from the left shoulder cap to just south of the left hip. 

Scars grow old and faded, but these are the ones harsh enough to be left even as the years go by. Ferdinand was not shy about his early scars back in their academy days, even the few that hadn’t come from training. He has little reason to be: many have similar scars although not perhaps as many as he does. On his own, Ferdinand collects wounds and forgets to heal them, much like he is prone to forget to brush and oil his hair. Much, in his own types of injury, as Hubert does. 

“We own our scars,” Ferdinand said as he traced the sickly purple-black lines that snake their way through Hubert’s frozen nerves. “They don’t own us.” 

“Nothing owns us,” Hubert said because they had just won a long, hard battle and the battle adrenaline and Ferdinand’s touch let him be bold. “We own ourselves.” 

The way Ferdinand smiled at him:

Hubert had never felt so much within himself before. 

**v.**

Dinner is pleasant. 

The kitchen prepares pheasant and eggs, the one dish they all enjoy. Hubert arrives a little late as he had to bathe after working in the labs, and Edelgard and Ferdinand have already gotten into the wine. It is stronger than last year’s although still young in body, and it goes well with the eggs if not as well with the pheasant. Usually, Edelgard is the lightest in drinking, and Ferdinand the hardest to get drunk, but Edelgard likes the wine and Ferdinand has likely not had a meal during the day. It is midsummer’s eve, and the company is good and conversation light. 

“Well,” Edelgard says after dinner is long cleared away, and she wobbles as she clambers to her feet, “I think I must stop. I have to be somewhat presentable for tomorrow’s festivities, you see.” 

“Edelgard!” Ferdinand laughs in his sprawl on his half of the broken duchess. “Please stay, I am not quite ready to turn in for the night!” 

“Of course you’re not,” Edelgard chuckles, flushed and smiling so easily. “Hubert, I must implore you to be the responsible one. I need you both tomorrow—the public will want to see us all to welcome the midsummer moon.” 

Hubert snorts and raises his half-full goblet to toast her departure. Edelgard smiles indulgently at him and then Ferdinand before she crosses the room to the door that enters her chambers. Hubert cannot help but smile back when she glances over her shoulder, looking at them with bright, happy eyes. 

“Good night, Lady Edelgard,” Hubert says. 

Her lips twitch, bringing a twinkle to her eyes. “Now I know you are drunk, too,” she says, teasingly as Ferdinand hoots with laughter. “No need for ‘lady’ else I will start calling you ‘minister’.” 

“You wouldn’t dare,” Hubert says, although he can feel his face and neck heating with embarrassment. 

“Hm,” is all Edelgard says, still smirking as she opens the door and is gone. 

“Oh, Hubert,” Ferdinand giggles, lurching up on the chair and picking up his almost empty wine goblet, “you are hopeless. Here, here, let us finish—cheers!”

Hubert taps his goblet against Ferdinand’s with a half-strangled, “Cheers,” before bringing it to his lips and swallowing the last mouthfuls down. 

“Well,” Ferdinand breathes, wiggling the stem of his emptied goblet between his fingers, “that isn’t quite fair. You had far more left than I!”

Hubert licks his lips, still feeling flushed. “I came later,” he reasons. 

Ferdinand giggles. He sets his goblet down on the low table and lifts his head to peer up at Hubert on the opposite side of the broken duchess. His hair falls into his face. The scent of hyacinths wafts in the air. 

“Hubert,” Ferdinand says, and he lifts the hand that has abandoned his goblet palm up, “I would like to kiss you.” 

Hubert shifts. Leans forward and puts the goblet on the table. When he looks back, Ferdinand is still in the same position, eyes tracking Hubert’s every move. 

It stirs something in Hubert he lived most of his life not even knowing he had. 

“Yes,” he says, and Ferdinand is already moving, hands to Hubert’s left shoulder and upper right arm, “you may.” 

The kiss is a little sloppy. Ferdinand is warm and tastes of wine and dinner. Hubert breathes in, the hyacinths strong as Ferdinand closes the distance between them to kneel half on the connecting footstool and half on Hubert’s lap. His hands drift down, squeezing on Hubert’s right elbow as the other trails over his chest. 

“Mhm,” Hubert says when Ferdinand breaks the kiss to lean back and look at Hubert with a small smile. “Have you missed me?” 

“What a cruel question,” Ferdinand murmurs, and his right hand dips between them to settle over Hubert’s left thigh. “Have you been overworking yourself in my absence?” 

“No,” Hubert says because Ferdinand will accuse him of lying either way; the light pressure and warmth of Ferdinand’s hand is distracting. “As you are well aware, we are not— _ah!_ ”

The way Ferdinand grins as he squeezes Hubert’s thigh just north of real pain is wicked. “Well, aren’t we a loudmouth,” he teases as Hubert hastily takes his left hand from Ferdinand’s side to cover his mouth. “You’re going to disturb our equally overworked _Lady_ Edelgard with too much of that.” 

Hubert glares at him as best he is able before lowering his hand enough to say, “Ferdinand, we should go to bed.” 

Ferdinand rolls his eyes, but he also pulls back. Hubert sits up straighter as Ferdinand climbs off him, finding his footing with only a little trouble. He turns back to Hubert and holds out a hand, lips already tugging upwards. 

“Come, _Minister_.” 

Hubert grabs his hand and follows.

**0.**

In the worst of it: 

They were at war for over two decades. Hubert knows that, from his youth until they stood over the last body of Those Who Slither in the Dark and placed the prison chains on Jeritza’s willing wrists, his and Edelgard’s war was almost a decade longer. The losses were great. Within Adrestia, those left from their Black Eagles to see the new dawn could be counted on one hand. 

And then Byleth, along with Felix, left. Selling their services and their swords, they’ve gone across and into the high mountains at the northern and eastern borders where there is the most work. Byleth’s departure was particularly hard on Edelgard, and Hubert could not assuage that hurt anymore than Ferdinand could. All they could do was make sure she didn’t shut herself away in the lonely safety of her rooms to work. 

None of them are good at doing much else. Working is easier than letting themselves stop and open themselves to regrets; work helps to tether them to reality. Hubert sometimes fears he might be tempted to visit Jeritza or that he might come to enjoy a vice too much, so work is a comfort. Ferdinand travels back to Aegir and often further afield to address things they had set aside until the war was truly finished. The trips rejuvenate him, and he brings Edelgard and Hubert news from far and wide like a magician of stories. 

Ferdinand’s role, too, is a burden from the war. Edelgard and Hubert are dependant upon him to bring that life to them, unable to come and go as they please for a long time yet. Edelgard rarely leaves Enbarr, and Hubert even less. Their roles are stationary and careful and, even with all the changes and progress they have made, throne-bound. Ferdinand rises forth to blossom and bloom and brings back the fresh air and the bounty that only grow outside city walls. 

But through this: 

For the first time in his forty years, Hubert has begun to dream. 

**vi.**

The midsummer moon is high and bright, just as the sun sets over the horizon. 

The main courtyard, which faces northeast into the city, has been opened and turned into a fairy-lighted dance floor. Edelgard has stepped out of her heavy red bodice and outer skirt to dance with members of the opera. Out of her regalia, she still is larger than life. The new braid she adopted after the true end of the war takes her hair down her back and allows for daisy chains to be plaited into it. Dancing the arms of the beaming crowd, without having to worry about every touch, sharing her rare smile with the world: 

“It makes everything worth it,” Ferdinand says at Hubert’s side, “to see her happy.” 

Hubert looks away. To Ferdinand, who has a glass of water to replenish himself from his own dancing. He let Hubert do his hair for the evening as well. His braids were more fussy than Edelgard straight hair, his waves and hidden curls fighting Hubert’s fingers. The effort was worth it, though, because he looks lovely with white satin in his sun-bright hair. 

“Hubert?” Ferdinand asks, a bit of concern in his eyes as Hubert realises he’s simply been staring. “Are you –”

“I am well,” Hubert says and he brushes the knuckles of his right hand against Ferdinand’s free left. “I was just admiring your hair.” 

“My hair!” Ferdinand laughs, the shadow to his face lifting immediately. “Admiring your handiwork or marveling at my continued incompetence in regards to grooming?” 

“Both, perhaps,” Hubert demures, if only to hear Ferdinand laugh again. 

They both look back out at the crowd. Edelgard is dancing with a young minstrel, who looks completely awestruck to have her full attention. There is a softness to Edelgard’s expression, almost nostalgic as she tends to be in the face of innocence. 

Hubert wonders, suddenly, if that is how he was looking at the doves. 

“Ferdinand,” Hubert says, but there is no immediate response. 

When he looks this time, Ferdinand is not looking at him nor the dancing crowd. Hubert follows his line of sight towards a group of children playing at the edge of the eastern gardens. It seems to be a chase sort of game, played in teams. A couple of the youngest children are distracted to playing in the dirt. 

The expression on Ferdinand’s face would seem strange to those who only know him as the Prime Minister. Hubert knows all of Ferdinand’s expressions just as he does Edelgard. 

“Ferdinand,” Hubert says, and he slips his fingers to curl around Ferdinand’s palm and squeezes. “Are you well?” 

It takes a moment, but Ferdinand closes his hand. Squeezes back. He tears his gaze from the children to meet Hubert. In the slight privacy of their spot between two yet unopened wine barrels and the empty path between the gardens and the main courtyard:

Ferdinand’s smile is soft and very sad. 

“I will be,” Ferdinand says as Hubert turns towards him, their hands clasped between. “It was all worth it, but at times like this…” 

He breathes in. Out. Hubert strokes his thumb over the side of Ferdinand’s hand. 

“One day,” Hubert says, and it is not a whisper; there is a boldness growing in his gut, “when this isn’t so new, we can take steps back. Edelgard and I leave this to people better than us relics, and your work can fully flourish. You could even go to Brigid as you and Petra once spoke.” 

“I think,” Ferdinand says, softer although he does not look away from Hubert, “that is where you and I differ.” 

Hubert pauses. He looks over Ferdinand’s face. At the soft set of his lips. The freckles that disguise the tiny pinprick scars on the left side of his face from when he saved Edelgard from an assassin he threw out a window. The crows feet and smile lines settling into his face. 

“I love to come home to you and Edelgard here,” Ferdinand says, and his eyes are bright but resolute. “I love to travel, and I love my work with the vines and horses and everything else, but I love most that I know you are here, and that you are safe, and that my nightmares that they tear apart your bodies in the dark and leave you to suffer where I cannot find you are just that: nightmares.”

Hubert swallows. He is selfishly, deeply glad that he is holding Ferdinand’s hand. His grip might be too tight, but it isn’t as if he risks breaking Ferdinand’s hand as he and Edelgard would Hubert. 

Ferdinand stares at him. 

Unblinking. 

Afraid. 

Edelgard has looked at him like this so many times over the years. 

To be here, at the end of it all, and still like this:

Hubert is blindingly, extraordinarily angry at their enemies all over again. 

“They are just nightmares,” Hubert finally manages.

He covers Ferdinand’s hand with both of his and tugs them up to rest against his chest. It doesn’t chase the fear from Ferdinand’s eyes, but it lets him blink. Hubert wants to kiss the strain at the edges of his eyes away. 

“Those who would hurt us are dead,” he says, even though he knows this will not reassure Ferdinand any more than it does Edelgard. “We will never be hurt like we were as children again.” 

“But I wasn’t a child,” Ferdinand says, and it isn’t arguing; it is fact. “And I wasn’t hurt as you and Edelgard were. I chose to do all that I have done.”

Hubert sucks in a breath. 

He feels like he might blow apart. 

“Do you remember,” Hubert says, thin and cracked and bare, “what you asked me when I picked glass out of your face?” 

Ferdinand nods. “I asked you how we would know when the war was truly over,” he says, still soft and searching. “And you said it would be obvious.”

“Well,” Hubert says, and he steps forward, damn anyone watching, and presses a kiss to Ferdinand’s lips, “the war is over, but I was wrong.” 

Because they lived too long in it. Hubert doesn’t always understand what it did to him because he was too young. It is the same with Edelgard but also different because she was even younger and what was done to her was worse. And now Hubert understands that the war did its own unique damage to Ferdinand because, even if he doesn’t wake the castle with his nightmares as Edelgard and Hubert do, they are there. 

Hubert pulls back. Looks at Ferdinand, who looks back with an expression of surprise. Not shock. Just surprise that morphs into wide-eyed, earnest concern.

“Hubert,” Ferdinand says, and he drops his water glass in the dirt to grasp Hubert’s left shoulder, “have you been at the bottle? Please, I know you have been having a hard time, too—I heard about the doves—, but if you are unwell –”

“The doves?” Hubert says, completely thrown. 

“Yes,” Ferdinand says, and he looks vaguely frantic. “They flew away. You were quite attached.”

“Ferdinand,” Hubert says, starting to feel like he’s losing control of the situation, “they are just doves. I know they must grow up and fly away.” 

“So you were attached to them,” Ferdinand says, oddly more frantic before barreling straight into: “And you just admitted you were wrong! You never –”

“I am perfectly capable –” 

“And you kissed me in public!” Ferdinand says, none too softly. 

“I am perfectly capable of kissing you in public!” Hubert says, his own voice rising. “Ferdinand, this is absurd, I was trying to explain –”

“The war is over!” Ferdinand cries, and he suddenly looks as if he might cry, which alarms Hubert more than anything so far and finally spurs him into action. 

He tugs them both through the wine barrels and back towards the castle. Ferdinand, after a brief squawk of surprise, lets him, his breathing uneven on swallowed sobs. Hubert’s heart pounds, adrenaline rushing through his damaged nerves like they are in fact at war again. 

_I’m sorry, Edelgard, but your ministers must go,_ Hubert almost shouts, but that would cause more disturbance than they already probably have. 

Hubert wonders, hysterically, if hysteria is contagious. 

Hubert’s office is his safe place. 

It is attached to his lab. Ferdinand doesn’t like the lab, but he has never protested Hubert’s office. Hubert locks them inside and deposits them both on the wide couch he sometimes sleeps on when working on sensitive experiments. Ferdinand lets him wipe tears from his face, leaning into the touch as if Hubert is the only thing keeping him from blowing apart. 

The feeling is mutual. 

“Ferdinand,” Hubert says, and he abhors how his voice wavers and nearly cracks, “I need you take deep breaths. From your stomach. Here. Please.” 

It takes a moment, but Ferdinand listens. Hubert keeps his palm against Ferdinand’s diaphragm, watching him breathe. In. Out. 

In. Out. 

In.

“Hubert,” Ferdinand says, more tears slipping out of his eyes. “I am sorry. I don’t know what came over me.” 

Hubert shakes his head. His own hysteria tends to rob him of his words at the most inopportune times. He wraps his arms around Ferdinand’s shoulders and allows himself the indulgence of laying his forehead against Ferdinand’s collarbone and shoulder cap. After a moment, Ferdinand’s arms come up. Wrap around Hubert’s back. 

They are quiet for a while. 

Slowly, Ferdinand’s breathing eases. The conscious deep breaths taper into a more natural breathing rhythm. Hubert can feel the pulse of Ferdinand’s blood against his forehead where it rests through the light summer formal wear. 

“I am sorry,” Ferdinand repeats, even though he doesn’t need to apologise at all. “I don’t know what came over me.” 

_I think I know what happened,_ Hubert thinks because he can’t yet make his tongue obey him. _It was all too much. We are too much._

“We just made complete fools of ourselves,” Ferdinand goes on, and he sounds sad and a little hopeless. “Leaving Edelgard like that. How ignoble of us. The whole celebration, the first since the end of the war –”

“Stop,” Hubert chokes out, and he fists his hands over Ferdinand’s torso to emphasise what his voice won’t allow. “Please.”

He quiets. Hubert takes a few shallow breaths. He slowly pulls back and sits up. Reaches up and rubs his hands over his face. He is suddenly aware of how badly he’s shaking. 

When he looks back to Ferdinand, to the terrified expression that is just like standing in another bloody battlefield: 

Hubert is so incredibly angry. 

Because he knows Ferdinand, even if he is absolutely out of his mind with terror, will never back down. He would never abandon Hubert or Edelgard or any of their friends who are no longer with them. Even those that didn’t support their cause: Ferdinand never held any ill-will towards them. He simply nodded and understood their ideals had led them down different paths. 

To know that Those Who Slither in the Dark crawled deep enough into Ferdinand to make him doubt himself: 

It’s not fair. Hubert wants to scream. It’s not fair. 

So he opens his mouth: 

“I was wrong,” Hubert says because it is true, and so is this: “I lied to you because I thought it would make you feel better. I misjudged. I won’t do it again. 

“I love you.”

Ferdinand stares at him. 

An age passes. 

Slowly, Ferdinand lifts his hands. Uncurls his fingers. Lays open his palms. 

Tears light his eyes. 

“I love you, too,” he says as Hubert takes his hands and leans forward, curling them together on the couch. “Hubert, I am so glad you are here. So very glad.” 

“As am I,” Hubert whispers.

He rests his ear against Ferdinand’s chest. Listens to his heartbeat and breathing. In. Out. 

In. Out. 

In. 

Some time later, when the moon is starting to crest and a long summer day dawning, Edelgard comes to them. She unlocks the office door, which means it is undoubtedly her as only she and Ferdinand know the spell. Byleth knows it as well, but Hubert doesn’t think he will ever see the professor again. 

“Ah,” Edelgard says as she spies them on the couch. 

“Hi,” Ferdinand says, pushing himself up and clearly embarrassed. 

“Hello, Edelgard,” Hubert says, unable to sit up because Ferdinand is using his chest for leverage.

“Did something happen?” Edelgard asks.

She crosses over to seat herself on the low table next to the couch, her washed hair still damp against her back. She has changed out of her evening clothes and wears only the meager summer sleeping dress she prefers. 

If this had been even a few years ago, when they were only just starting to look at the end, Hubert would be alarmed she walked through the castle like this. Ferdinand would have been scandalised. 

Now: 

“We,” Hubert says as Ferdinand sits back against the couch and moves his hands from Hubert’s chest, “needed to talk.” 

“Ah,” Edelgard says, and she smiles a little because Ferdinand, with his hips on one side of Hubert’s thighs and his feet resting on the space on the other side is clearly too embarrassed to speak. “A member of the kitchen staff saw the two of you leaving urgently. I believe they assumed some business came up.” 

Hubert’s lip twitch even as Ferdinand flushes. They have often run off together over the years, although this is the first time that it was not for business. 

“We will not make this a habit,” Hubert says because he is fairly sure that they will not have to repeat that particular conversation. 

“No,” Ferdinand says, a little strangled. 

Edelgard gazes at them. Not judging. More assessing. She looks very relaxed. Calm, even. Hubert wonders more than a little at that. 

He never thought of Edelgard as someone who could be calm. She has always had to be so focused and driven. Unwavering to lead them through even the darkest paths. 

To see her smile, calm and warm, is a luxury Hubert did not know could exist. 

“I don’t mind,” she says, the smile remaining in place and at ease on her lips. “It is the Midsummer Moon. I felt like dancing, and I knew you two were here. It is nice, I think, to sometimes have such simple desires now.” 

Hubert doesn’t know what to say. 

“It is,” Ferdinand says, very softly. 

Edelgard nods. She breaks the end of the motion with an open-mouthed yawn. She reaches up to swipe the slight tears the wideness of the yawn left at the edges of her eyes. She looks at them, the smile still on her face. 

“Perhaps we should try to catch some sleep,” she says, rising again and smoothing her dress. “Careful of your leg, Hubert. It’ll stiffen if you leave it in that position. Mind him, Ferdinand.” 

“Yes, of course,” Ferdinand says, and Hubert feels him shift and his hands moving to slightly bend the knee of Hubert’s bad leg. 

“Good evening, Edelgard,” Hubert says as she moves towards the door. “Ferdinand, stop, I’m not an invalid.” 

Edelgard opens the door with a soft huff of a chuckle.

“Good evening, Hubert, Ferdinand,” Edelgard says before stepping out and closing the door. 

Hubert starts to slide his torso back with his hands so he can sit up as well. Ferdinand looks to the door as the lock flashes before turning his attention back to Hubert. His lips twitch slightly. They both look a little haggard but better than a couple hours ago. 

There is nothing to hide from each other. 

Hubert lets himself reach out. Ferdinand’s lips spread into a fuller smile as Hubert slips between his knees. 

“I am to mind you,” Ferdinand says, lightly teasing as he settles his arms around Hubert’s waist. 

“Don’t be daft,” Hubert says before leaning in for a kiss. 

Ferdinand’s laughter is sweet, even muffled by the kiss. It reverberates through him. His heart. His blood. Flesh. 

In Hubert’s dead nerves: 

He loves. 

**vii.**

In the late spring a year later, the dove comes back. 

“Your bird’s building another nest,” the gatekeepers inform Hubert as he climbs the steps on the tail end of his morning walk. “Look.”

Hubert looks up. Sure enough, there is a small collection of hay and what looks like string on the jutting stone. He stares for a long moment before looking back to the gatekeepers, who are both smiling at him. 

“Midsummer will be coming soon,” Hubert says, as he inclines his head to depart into the castle. “We must be diligent with our planning.” 

“Yes, Minister,” the gatekeepers say, amusement tinging their voices as Hubert goes on his way. 

He walks towards the morning audiences. Today is the Fishmonger Guild, who are in some sort of internal dispute. Edelgard will likely want to finish the audience as quickly as possible to avoid escalation of the conflict and she can look at possibly going to the opera in the evening. Hubert wonders if the news of the dove’s return has reached her yet. 

He will have to write about the dove to Ferdinand, who is assisting once again with Aegir’s planting. He already has a message half written to bring an additional barrel of wine. They are trying to raise funds for a new nursery school. Edelgard and Manuela have come up with the idea for a charity auction, and Aegir wine is one of the hottest commodities. 

There is still so much work to do. So many hurdles to overcome, both for the good of Fódlan and within themselves. 

Hubert fully intends to see it through. Their efforts bear fruit. There is much to look forward to. And, on top of it all: 

Ferdinand will be home soon.

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to connect with me on [Twitter @Metallic_Sweet](https://twitter.com/Metallic_Sweet)


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